Self-checkout stations at grocery stores and other retail stores are well known. The stations permit a consumer to scan articles for purchase so the station may identify the articles and a corresponding price. When the consumer indicates all articles for purchase have been presented to the terminal, a sub-total is accumulated, any taxes and discounts are computed, and a total amount due is displayed for the consumer. The station then allows the consumer to select a payment method. The station presents menu selections to the consumer so funds may be transferred to the retailer's account. Upon confirmation of payment, the articles are released to the consumer.
A self-checkout station typically includes a terminal, a scanner and scales for reading unit price codes (UPC) and determining article weight, a cashier keypad and display, a POS terminal for payment entry, a receipt printer, a change unit, and a checkout area for holding articles once they have been scanned. The terminal also includes a display, a processor, memory, programmed instructions, and data peripherals to control the operations of the station. The programmed instructions may contain modules for querying for article prices, computing totals and performing other functions related to the purchase of articles through a self-checkout station. Some checkout stations may also include a security application program that uses data from sensors such as scales to reduce the likelihood that the consumer leaves without scanning all of the articles or exchanges scanned articles with more expensive articles that have not been scanned.
While self-checkout stations have been used in retail establishments where articles are sold to consumers, they have not been used for the checkout of rental articles. The absence of self-checkout stations in rental stores, especially video rental stores, is due to a variety of factors. For one, most video cassettes and digital video disks (DVDs) have permanent electronic article surveillance (EAS) tags attached to them. Permanent EAS tags are used because the time required for completely deactivating an EAS tag can be relatively long. The video rental business has periods of intense activity in which many people are trying to obtain videos for an evening or weekend. Consequently, the activity of deactivating EAS tags reduces the throughput of customers and may cause long lines and consumer frustration at the checkout counters. However, EAS tag interrogators are placed at the doors of video rental stores so consumers cannot enter the store with videos previously rented and return them to the shelves to avoid late charges. Of course, the interrogators also detect videos that consumers try to conceal for the purposes of taking them from the store without authorization. Thus, rental checkout attendants carry the videos that have been processed for rental through a path that avoids detection by the EAS tag interrogators and place them at a pickup area for a consumer. Self-checkout stations have been devised that facilitate EAS tag deactivation but none are known that process rental articles with permanent surveillance tags so articles with such tags may be removed without compromising store security.
Another issue that impedes the use of self-checkout stations in rental stores is the return of rented articles. Typically, they are placed in a designated area before one enters the EAS interrogation zone and processed for return at a time when the attendants are not busy with the checkout of other articles. When the returned articles are processed, attendants scanned a barcode on the article to update a database with an indication that the article has been returned and to determine whether the article has been untimely returned. In the event of untimely return, late charges are applied to the consumer's account. Also, as video rental stores have permitted articles to be checked out for multiple day periods, credits may be issued for the return of articles prior to expiration of the checkout period. Self-checkout stations used in stores where articles are purchased are not designed for the return of articles or for the issuance of credits or charges against a consumer's account in response to the return of articles.
What is needed is a way of providing self-checkout capability at a rental store without disabling detection of the unauthorized return of rented articles.
What is needed is a way of processing rental articles returned to the rental store for credit or late fees.